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November 9, 2004
Dunstan Orchard designed his site header to mimic the view and weather of his parent's home in Dorset. To do so he created
90 illustrations reflecting the local weather such as cloud condition, wind, humidity, etc. and matched the pics with a XML feed from
weather.com. The design features a panel which folds out from beneath the current illustration and presents detailed local weather for both San Francisco & Dorset. Dunstan's
talent and attention to detail are astounding. I've only scratched the surface of what he does with this site.
posted by filchyboy at 10:22 PM PST - 25 comments
Discovering Japan. As a
perennial outsider at loose in Japan,
writer Donald Richie captures the
joyous freedom of being foreign. The foreign observer is likely to be happy only if he sees his foreignness as an adventure, and recognizes that he has given up a sense of belonging
for a sense of freedom, traded the luxury of being understood for that of being permanently interested.
Richie, the philosopher-king of expats in Asia for the past half-century, arrived in Tokyo in 1947 as a typist with the U.S. government and never really left,
writing dozens of books ,
on Japanese movies,
temples, history and
fashion, while enjoying himself as an actor, musician, filmmaker and painter.
The Japan Journals: 1947-2004 is a monument to the
pleasures of displacement. Richie watchers can observe, more intimately than ever, a man who is generally happiest observing. More inside.
posted by matteo at 5:28 PM PST - 12 comments
Lose WeightMoney Fast! If you click on this link, you'll go to an apparent sales site for "FatFoe
TM Eggplant Extract" another 'miracle' weight loss aid. But click on the
Order Now! link and you get a lecture from the FTC on how to avoid getting scammed by diet products that are too good to be true, all part of the US Federal agency's
campaign against diet fraud.
posted by wendell at 4:10 PM PST - 12 comments
Last night's aurora borealis was seen in, among other places,
Idaho, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana,
Nebraska, New York, Virginia, and
Wisconsin. Recent sightings are reported
here, and lots of charts and graphs that I don't understand are
here courtesy of the government.
posted by PrinceValium at 10:42 AM PST - 20 comments
Pharmacist Refuses to Dispense Birth Control (USA Today link, sorry)
A pharamacist has decided that she's morally opposed to birth control and so has refused to dispense it to her clients. Neverminding the fact that its her job.
"The American Pharmacists Association, with 50,000 members, has a policy that says druggists can refuse to fill prescriptions if they object on moral grounds, but they must make arrangements so a patient can still get the pills. Yet some pharmacists have refused to hand the prescription to another druggist to fill."
If a pharmacist refuses to fill your prescription and you suffer for it (pregnancy or whatever) wouldn't that pharmacy and pharmacist be culpable for your suffering?
Doesn't this just expose these drug stores to massive lawsuits? Or just massive boycotts?
posted by fenriq at 10:27 AM PST - 90 comments
Germs, Germs Everywhere... Get Over It "The makers of antibacterial products are fond of the word 'germs.' It is purposefully vague. Do they mean bacteria? Viruses? Both? Neither? Because the idea is simply to connote contamination. These products are as much about cooties as they are about viruses or bacteria."
posted by Irontom at 10:11 AM PST - 16 comments
The Mormon Peanut Butter Assassin David Race Bannon was serving as a Mormon missionary in Korea when he was caught up in a peanut butter smuggling ring that led to his imprisonment and eventual recruiting by Interpol for project "Archangel," a team of assassins trained to hunt down and terminate the leaders of child sex rings. Whew. Oh, and he
has a book out. Is it just me, or does this sound a little . . . odd?
posted by mecran01 at 9:51 AM PST - 35 comments
Zicam is an amazing intranasal gel that shortens the duration and reduces the severity of the common cold. I've had four colds so far this fall (I've got a toddler) and all of them disappeared within a day. Problem is, now reports are saying that if you get this stuff too far up your nose, you could
lose your sense of smell. Damn!
posted by fungible at 8:09 AM PST - 15 comments
If you want to use
Firefox but still want the alt text for web images to appear when you hover the mouse pointer over them, then you want
this.
posted by Pretty_Generic at 8:01 AM PST - 28 comments
